Project Description

Clyde Butcher St. Armands Gallery

“Today the foremost landscape photographer in America is Clyde Butcher, whose immense and shockingly beautiful black and white views of the land make him the only natural successor to Ansel Adams, although he eclipses that father of American landscape photography through his vision and his use of size, clarity, light and composition. He will be one of the greatest photographers in American history.”

—Aaron De Groft, Ph.D. Muscarelle Museum of Art, College of William and Mary

Clyde Butcher has traveled extensively across the United States and abroad to capture the diversity, dignity, and beauty of nature on film for more than 50 years. His extensive body of work has been assembled into four stunning collections which are recognized and exhibited in museums nationally and around the world: United States, International, Florida, and National Parks

Butcher’s spectacular and inspiring photographs of the remote and undisturbed wild places of Florida, his home state, are especially admired by other artists, critics, and collectors. Emmy Award-winning filmmaker Ken Burns, creator of the documentary series, The National Parks: America’s Best Idea, has called Butcher’s work a “national treasure.”

Using a variety of antique large format view cameras ranging in size from 4 ̋ x 5 ̋ to 12 ̋ x 20 ̋ he creates photographs up to 5′ x 9′ in size. The epic scale of his work lets you experience the location in a way that is almost like being there. Their large dimensions, combined with their strong sense of fluidity and movement, allow his work to transcend the static nature of the photographic medium.

In this digital age Clyde is one of those rare photographers who still makes his photographs in the ‘wet’ darkroom’ allowing him to express elaborate detail and textures that distinguish the intricacy of the landscape.

Butcher has been invited to undertake projects for Everglades National Park, Rocky Mountain National Park, Audubon Society, The Nature Conservancy, and Wilderness Society, as well as other prominent environmental organizations. He has received many prestigious awards and been the subject of various news and PBS programs, including Lifetime Achievement Award from the North American Nature Photography Association, Ansel Adams Award from the Sierra Club, the Florida Artist Hall of Fame award, the highest honor presented to a private citizen, Distinguished Artist Award from the Florida House in D.C., Who will be the next Ansel Adams by Popular Photography Magazine, Top 100 Most Influential People in Florida by Florida Trend, ABC Person of the Week with Peter Jennings, and many other awards and publications.

Clyde Butcher represents what we hope all great artist of our country hold true in their work: the responsibility of communicating the goodness of our world through the arts. – President Jimmy Carter